Well, what could I do? Tell him to go home to Papa, after he'd saved my life? Right.
So we went along together. Gilbert insisted that I ride the horse, and I insisted that I didn't-if it doesn't have brakes and a gear shift, I'm not interested.
"You shall have to learn to ride, if you stay long in our land!" he remonstrated.
"I'm not planning to," I assured him. "What's a nice kid like you doing in the military, anyway?"
"Why, for that good folk need protecting!" He was mildly scandalized that I even asked.
Well, that made sense. "But why as a monk?"
"I felt the call," he said simply. "I have a vocation."
I'd always wondered about that. "What's it feel like-the call? Did you have a dream? A sudden moment of enlightenment?"
"I have heard of such," he said slowly, "yet in my case, 'twas simply that there was a famine when I was so small that all I can remember is the great gnawing in my belly, and the kindly face of the monk who came at last to give my family a loaf of bread. In the rush of gratitude that came then, I wished to be like him - and that wish never left me."
"Just a good example." I frowned. "Didn't it bother you, when you were old enough to know what was going on, to find out that some monks were greedy and lustful?"
His face hardened. "I did hear of such, aye, though we only knew of one, ourselves - but we did learn of a whole abbey full of them, miles away, and heard that other abbeys did visit grinding rents upon their tenants, the whiles their monks did live in luxury. Yet the monks who dwelt nearby us lived in a cloister they had built with their own hands and which they themselves had enlarged and repaired. They farmed, even as we did, and would not accept gifts of any more land than they themselves could till."
"Sounds like the Franciscans," I said.
He frowned. "I know none of that name. Their example has shone down the years of my life, though. I cannot condemn all clergy for the mistakes of a few, aye, or even of many, when those I have met myself are good and godly men."
I nodded. "Then why didn't you join their order?"
"Alas! As I grew older, I found that I was fond of fighting. The good monks did rebuke me, and I strove hard to contain my anger at others' taunts; but when they struck at me, I felt outrage at their injustice and smote them down. Then did I come near to despair, thinking myself fit only for the plow and never for the cloister-but the monk who came to say Mass for us, every Sunday, did learn of this and told me of the order of Saint Moncaire. 'If you must needs strike a blow,' quoth he, 'let it be the minions of Satan that you smite, so that you may protect the poor and weak.' Thereupon my heart did thrill, and I gave my poor parents no rest till they agreed to let me try my vocation, and I went to the monastery as a squire."
I nodded. "So you like fighting, but you wanted to be a monk, and the Moncaireans let you combine the two. Very neat. And you wanted to be a knight?"
"What lad does not? Yet I knew I could not, for I was baseborn; I wished only to be a squire, and never thought I could be more."
"Oh." I frowned. "So that's how it goes here, is it' You have to be born a knight in order to become one?"
"'Tis possible that a lowborn squire may be knighted for great courage and prowess," he pointed out, "yet 'tis rare."
"A battlefield commission, huh? And of course, he'll never really be accepted by the other officers."
"Your terms are strange - yet 'tis so. His children, though, will be ranked with any, for they will have grown with other knights. Natheless, 'tis otherwise, in my order-any lad may become a knight of Saint Moncaire, if he proves his vocation. Yet it will take great deeds to win my spurs." He flashed me a grin. "Therefore, lead me into danger, Wizard Saul! For I would prove my worth!"
"I'll try not to arrange it," I assured him, but I had this secret, nagging dread that he was going to get his wish. Maybe right now. We came to the top of a rise and saw a huge crack in the ground right in front of us. It was a gorge, and it stretched away out of sight to the right and left.
But there was a bridge over it. Very narrow, but it was a bridge.
"Well, at least there's a way over." As we came up to it, though, I developed doubts - it looked kind of flimsy.
"Looks like single file," I told Gilbert. "Think it'll take your horse's weight?"
He scanned it with a practiced eye - I guessed he'd been trained in military engineering. "Aye, if I dismount."
"Good enough." I started out across.
"Nay, Wizard Saul!" he yelped. "First we must test for-"
"Ho! Ho!" something tumbled.
I stopped and glanced at the sky. "Thunder?"
"Worse!" Gilbert cried. "Flee, Wizard!" Hands as wide as bread boxes slapped onto the railing. Something huge and smelly swung itself up in an arc and landed with a shock that made the bridge sway. I held tight to the railing and stared, totally dumfounded.
It was about eight feet tall and shaped like a turnip, with legs as thick as kegs coming out of the narrow end. The wide end tapered down into two tentacles with the huge hands on the ends, and two eyes the size of dinner plates stared down at me from its chest. Beneath them, a knob of nose twitched over a vast slice of mouth, which opened in a grin set with shark's teeth.
"What the hell is that?" I yelped.
"'Tis a troll!" Gilbert howled. "Not from Hell, but vile enough! Stand aside, Wizard Saul, and let me have at him!"
"How?" I looked frantically to left and right, but there was no place to jump to. Then I remembered that I knew how to swim. I turned to dive over the rail, but Gilbert called, "Nay! He'll leap in after you and catch you in a trice!" I wondered crazily if a trice was anything like a net, as I turned back to watch the troll slobbering toward me. I backed away, blurting, "But you can't be real-you're a fugitive from a fairy tale! So I can't be your meal!"
The monster jerked to a halt and glanced about him, and I could have sworn he was looking nervous. So help me, one huge finger came up over his mouth, looking for all the world as if he were trying to shush me!
"I will not be silenced!" I cried. "The word is my weapon!" The troll shrank back, hands coming up to fend me off, and Gilbert cried, "A deft stroke! oh, bravely done! Smite him again, Wizard!"
"How?" I cried.
The troll relaxed, straightening up with a slobbering grin, and came slavering toward me again.
I backed away fast, wondering what had spooked it. "What's a matter, big guy? You worried about fairies?"
The troll jerked to a stop again, making frantic shushing motions and glancing about him.
"You are!" I cried in triumph. "You're afraid of the word itself! Okay, Gruesome, try this one on for size!
The troll gave a moan of fear and jumped.
He landed on top of me, and I slammed a punch in sheer reflex and howled; it had felt like hitting rock. The howl was a mistake, because then I had to inhale, just as that huge midriff slammed me back against the wood, Something cracked under me; I saw stars, and my whole universe was filled with the incredible stench of that monster. I couldn't believe it - that close to water, and he didn't bathe?
Dimly, I beard Gilbert yelling, and heard something that sounded like ringing.
Then, suddenly, there was light, and the hideous smell was gone. I gasped, pushing myself up as quickly as I could - and there, so help me, were a dozen little guys scarcely as tall as my knee, in red caps and brown outfits, kicking at that troll and pinching him, How their pinches could make any progress against that granite skin, I didn't know - but I wasn't about to object.